KAWASAKI ZX750-E TURBO

PIG IRON BOB (also known as Sir Robert Gordon Menzies) drooled Thomas Ford’s ungrammatical “I did but see her passing by, and yet I love her till I die” during Her Majesty the Queen’s visit to Australia in 1963 and made those words forever a part of Australia’s history. Good thing, too, because it provides me with the perfect description of what happened to me when I first saw a Kawasaki Turbo. I didn’t even see the real thing, just a photo in a press release, but it’s hard to find a rhyme for ‘press release’, so forgive me for flogging Ford’s words just like Ming did.

IT ONLY LASTED FOR TWO MODEL YEARS,AND EVEN THAT WAS LONGER THAN THE LIFE OF TWO OF THE OTHER THREE JAPANESE TURBOCHARGED MOTORCYCLES. SO WHAT’S THE STORY?

The black and white image originally released by Kawasaki was of an unpainted bike, but even that immediately caught my eye. When I later saw a photo the painted version I was completely sold. I rang Roger Young, the head honcho at Kawasaki Motors Australia and told him I wanted the first one to hit Australian shores. Roger, a tall and somewhat self-effacing Kiwi, was evasive but promised me the first bike he